Categories

Google+ Badge

Tuesday, 27 June 2017

How to Import PST to Office 365 Mailbox

One can make use of the network-upload-option and Office 365’s Import service to import PST to Office 365 mailbox. Network-upload implies the uploading of PST files into a temporary storage space in Microsoft’s cloud. After that, Office 365’s Import service would help to convert PST files from the storage space to the targeted mailbox.

Steps to Migrate PST to Office 365 mailbox

Download PST import tool and the key: The First step involves downloading the PST import tool & key for the private Azure’s storage location. Users have to download this command-line tool of Azure’s AzCopy and also fetch the access key for uploading PST files to some storage location of Azure in Microsoft’s cloud. These can be obtained from Office 365’s Security-and-Compliance-Center’s Import page. The key is known as the SAS key or the secure-access-signature key, providing the much-needed permissions for uploading PST data files to the private & secure storage location of Azure. These access keys are unique to all organizations and help them prevent any unauthorized or unintended access to these PST files once they have been uploaded to Microsoft’s cloud. It is important to note that to import PST to Office 365 shared mailbox does not need any enterprise to have an Azure’s subscription separately.

Upload PST files to Azure’s storage area: The second step involves the usage of AzCopy.exe, which is the tool that has been downloaded for uploading and storing PST files in Azure’s storage area residing in the same Microsoft’s regional data center where Office 365’s enterprise has been located. For uploading these, PST files, which are required to be migrated to Office 365, are to be located in file-share/file-server of the enterprise. It is important to note here that there is an optional step, which can be performed for viewing the PST file’s list after they have been uploaded to the storage area.

Creation of a PST import mapping file: After PST files get uploaded to Azure’s storage space location, then the very next step involves the creation of a CSV or the comma-separated-value file specifying which are all the users' mailboxes to which these PST data would get imported. In the operation to convert Outlook PST to Office 365 mailbox, the .pst files get imported to user’s primary mailboxes or archive mailboxes. Office 365’s Import service would use this information in CSV file to migrate PST to Office 365 mailbox.

Creating PST’s import job: After the above step, it is now time for creating the PST’s import job on Security-and-Compliance-Center’s Import page and then submit that PST import-mapping file thus created before in the last step. After creating this import job, Office 365 would analyze PST file’s data. This will be giving a chance for setting filters. These filters would control which data would actually get imported to mailboxes that have been specified in that PST-import-mapping file.

Filter PST data imported to mailbox: After the creation and initiation of the import job, Office 365 would analyze PST file’s data. This is done in a safe and secure way. The analysis would happen by identifying the item’s age and the different types of messages that are included in those PST files. On the completion of the analysis, when data is finally ready to get transferred, users will have an option to migrate PST to Office 365 archive mailbox, covering the entire data in PST files. Trimming of data that has to be imported is also possible. This can be done by setting filters that control which data has to be imported.

Starting PST’s import job: After the start of the import job, Office 365 would use that PSTimport mapping file's information to convert PST from Azure’s storage area to user’s mailboxes. Import job’s status information would include all PST file information, which is being imported. This information gets displayed on Security-and-Compliance-Center’s Import page. When this finishes, job status will be set to Complete.

Another Alternative

Office 365’s Import service is a very powerful and effective method to import PST file to Office 365 mailbox. But it is also known fact that using this command-line tool and CSV file is quite an intricate and lengthy process. Modern experiences are making such a process much easier and simplified, like the use of commercial solutions and services provided by reliable vendors like SysTools.

Concluding Lines

Hope that the detailed process instructions will help you to successfully migrate Outlook PST to Office 365 mailbox. The steps provided in the above article will be very useful for the administrators who are attempting to import PST to Office 365 shared mailbox. They can export emails, contacts, and calendars from Outlook’s .pst file to Office 365 using the given methods. Else, commercial vendors too can be approached for this purpose.